horses trotted on road

Question
hello sir, at our racetracks, few of our horses are trotting in the evenings on the road. i asked my uncle, why like that, cant they be trotted in sand, since it makes them fit. he said, sand and road has different methods of making a horse fit. we use sand to improve their respiration and we trot horses on road to make their joints fit. is he correct?? if yes, may i know how??

Answer
hi-- well every trainer has their own ideas on how to train horses. hard surfaces might be better to train certain horses on and deep sand may be better for other horses to train on. i guess it depends on the soundness of each horse.i personally think that a deep sand ring of at least 60 feet in size is the better of the two ways of training. deep sand will leg them up and build mussel and wind and not hurt the feet or legs. i cannot say that your uncle is wrong in his thoughts . thanks ED HESS